T5 an embarrassment

British Airways boss Willie Walsh admitted yesterday that the opening of Heathrow's Terminal 5 had been 'a disaster'. And he said the airport had been 'a national embarrassment for years'.

The damning assessments came as Mr Walsh and bosses at airport operator BAA were grilled by MPs about the T5 fiasco which led to hundreds of flights being cancelled and tens of thousands of bags going missing. Mr Walsh admitted:

'We let our customers down. We could have done better and should have done better.'

He added: 'I take responsibility for the issues that went wrong.' But he insisted he would not resign.

The MPs heard that the owners of around 125 bags were still waiting to be reunited with their luggage, while 17 of the T5 lifts were still not working.

The £4.3billion terminal was opened by the Queen on March 14. But its first day of operations on March 27 was catastrophic. It was several days before British Airways was able to run a full service there and the airline postponed the planned April 30 transfer of longhaul flights to the new terminal.

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Mr Walsh, BA's chief executive, told MPs on the Commons Transport Committee: 'People have spoken of T5 as a national embarrassment. If we were to be honest, Heathrow has been a national embarrassment for many years.'

He added: 'We believed that T5 was ready to open and we believed we had prepared sufficiently. With the benefit of hindsight, it was clear we made some mistakes.'

Mr Walsh said BA had ' compromised on the testing' because of delays in building the terminal. On the first day a combination of teething troubles and baggage problems proved insurmountable.

The airline chief said: 'We didn't supply staff with sufficient training and familiarisation. 'If we did it again, we would do things differently.'

Last month BA said operations director Gareth Kirkwood and customer services director David Noyes would be leaving and linked their departures to the T5 debacle.

Mr Walsh declined to comment yesterday, saying the two men were 'not here to defend themselves'. He insisted: 'The decisions taken ultimately rest with me. I am prepared to be held responsible. My position is a matter for the board.' MPs expressed incredulity that airport-bosses seemed unaware of the misgivings of some people ahead of the T5 opening.

BAA chief executive Colin Matthews. who also apologised 'unreservedly', insisted he had not been aware of any likely problems.

He said the company had not yet investigated 'who knew what or when' and added: 'We have not sought to blame others. Some problems were undoubtedly our fault and some were not.'